Bureaucracy

I wrote here about a doctor who preyed on Indian boys and young men on reservations for decades before finally being brought to justice. One of my closest childhood friends battled the bureaucracy to blow the whistle on the predator, with the result that he–my friend, not the predator–was effectively forced out of the Indian Health Service. That appalling story was reported by the Wall Street Journal and PBS Frontline. »

The Wall Street Journal reports the appalling story of Dr. Pat Weber, a pediatrician who apparently preyed on young Indian boys for decades without being held accountable. The story caught my attention because it featured, in a positive role, one of my closest boyhood friends: At first, officials at the U.S. Indian Health Service overlooked the peculiarities of their unmarried new doctor, including the children’s toys he hoarded in his »

People tend to think that bureaucracy is a problem of centralization—of power concentrated in Washington, DC, or in state capitals. I think the problem of bureaucracy is more cultural than organizational or doctrinal. The culture of bureaucracy has taken root in most local governments—the unit of government supposedly closest and most responsive to the people. Like the turtles in the probably apocryphal story of Bertrand Russell, it’s bureaucracy all the »

On Friday, President Trump signed three executive orders aimed reforming the federal bureaucracy. The first order makes it easier to fire incompetent federal employees. The second limits the amount of time federal employees can be paid for union work. The third requires federal agencies to negotiate union contracts in less than a year. Last year, Congress passed a law that made it easier for the Department of Veterans Affairs to »

The infamous Nunes memo has been released in the last hour. The House website is intermittently clogging up as you might imagine, but you can try to download it yourself here or here. On a quick first read, there is not much in it that we didn’t already know in general terms— the flyblown Steele dossier was the sole “evidence” the FBI used to obtain a FISA warrant to monitor »

Everyone knows that under Barack Obama, and perhaps prior presidents, the quality of health care rendered by the Veterans Administration slipped. By the end of the Obama administration, the situation had become catastrophic. This is one of many areas where the Trump administration, together with the Republican Congress, has brought about meaningful reform. On the Laura Ingraham show this morning, one of my guests was Veterans Affairs Secretary David Shulkin. »

We had a lively discussion last night on the Power Line VIP video chat about the “permanent government,” or “the swamp” as Trump and others call it, and how difficult it is to conquer. It reminded me that I’ve been thinking for years about teaching an entire course based on episodes of the great “Yes, Minister” and “Yes, Prime Minister” BBC series, which holds up astoundingly well after 30 years »

That is a question I never thought I would need to ask. But, via InstaPundit, law professor Randy Barnett makes an alarming point: Democrats’ #Resistance is creating a genuine constitutional crisis in which governmental power is not allowed by them to be peacefully transferred after a lawful election. The potential for escalation is very very dangerous. https://t.co/vPRjzbhwPI — Randy Barnett (@RandyEBarnett) December 6, 2017 Barnett was responding to this tweet: »

This is one of many similar stories we have seen over the past seven months, which cause one to question the judgment of those who claim to be conservatives, but who favored Hillary Clinton over Donald Trump. The Free Beacon reports: “Trump Rolls Back Onerous Diversity Regs.” The Trump administration blocked Obama-era rules that would have saddled employers with hundreds of millions of dollars in compliance costs and increased paperwork »

Former Acting Attorney General Sally Yates, an Obama holdover, recently authored one of the most pernicious columns within memory in the New York Times. Her column was titled, “Protect the Justice Department From President Trump.” Yates argued, in essence, that there exists an Executive Branch that is independent of, and superior to, the President–at least as long as that Executive Branch is staffed pretty much exclusively by Democrats. This is, »

Unfortunately, it isn’t the federal government. It’s Apple, Inc.: A recording of an internal briefing at Apple earlier this month obtained by The Outline sheds new light on how far the most valuable company in the world will go to prevent leaks about new products. The briefing, titled “Stopping Leakers – Keeping Confidential at Apple,” was led by Director of Global Security David Rice, Director of Worldwide Investigations Lee Freedman, »

Reading the news stories that have created the consuming controversies of the past few days, this is what I see. Hostile officials inside the executive branch of the government seek the removal of Donald Trump from office. They are powerful. They lack any qualms about abusing their positions. And they are determined. With malicious intent, “current officials” inside the intelligence agencies with access to top secret information, for example, have »

The Washington Post reports that some federal workers are “in regular consultation with recently departed Obama-era political appointees about what they can to to push back against the new president’s initiatives.” In addition, “180 federal employees have signed up for a workshop next weekend where experts will offer advice on workers’ rights and how they can express civil disobedience.” One Justice Department employee told the Post that “through leaks to »

Who knows just how the clash between the Trump Administration and career bureaucrats will play out, but for the time being we have the great Dan Mitchell to thank for bringing our attention to this splendid video from someone in Latin America, where bureaucracy is a fine art (just 3:30 long): »

Donald Trump’s comeback in the polls has the Washington Post rattled. Yesterday, its editorial board basically called, Bernie Sanders like, for a moratorium on discussing Hillary Clinton’s emails so that the focus can be on Donald Trump’s “manifest unfitness for office.” But Clinton’s willingness to put her personal interests ahead of the national security and her unwillingness to discuss the matter honestly after she was found out are good grounds »

John Fund reports that congressional Republicans increased the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights with a very generous budget increase last year. Fund takes up the matter in the NR column “How Republicans feed the beast of political correctness.” OCR is perhaps the most left-wing office in the federal bureaucracy. Bankrolling it that way Congress did was an egregious error (for which they were rewarded with the transgender guidance). »

I’m on airplanes all day today, making my way to Michigan where, it turns out, I’ll be meeting John in a bar late tonight. (This is how conspiracy rumors get started. Stand by for some clandestine video.) Meanwhile, I note a great letter to the editor of the Wall Street Journal this morning from Laura Hirschman making the same point I did here last week (“Bush League De-Regulation?“) about Jeb »